Compared to What

"Compared to What" was written by American singer and songwriter Gene McDaniels. It was copyrighted in 1966. Its lyrics have a variety of social commentary. It contains lyrics against the Vietnam War and the then-President of the United States Lyndon B. Johnson with lines: "The president, he's got his war / Folks don't know just what it's for / Nobody gives us rhyme or reason / Have one doubt, they call it treason". Written during the second wave feminist movement before abortion rights became federal law in the US in 1973, its lyrics broached the topic with "unwed mothers need abortion". In 1976, the popular American music critic B. Lee Cooper suggested that the song "of social criticism attacked a variety of social practices as being based on hypocritically 'unreal values and contrasted "the social myth of equality and the economic reality of poverty in the stratified American society." ==Original version==

The first recording appears to have been by American jazz pianist and vocalist Les McCann for his 1966 album Les McCann Plays the Hits. ==Cover versions==

By 2011, the song had been covered by more than 270 performers, including Ray Charles Roberta Flack Flack recorded the song in February 1969, for her debut album, First Take, and "Compared to What" was her first single. Flack's manager that year was McCann. A contemporary reviewer suggested that her singing was "in a fiery rhythmic way reminiscent of the throbbing motion heard during congregational singing at Southern Baptist churches." Flack's version was included in the 1997 film Boogie Nights and the 2015 film The Man from U.N.C.L.E. McCann-Harris version McCann (piano) and Harris (tenor saxophone) had performed earlier at the 1969 Montreux Jazz Festival and agreed to play together on June 21, 1969, with Benny Bailey (trumpet), Leroy Vinnegar (bass), and Donald Dean (drums). The single also appeared on the U.S. Cash Box Top 100 for two weeks in January 1970, with a peak position of No. 96. The commercial success of the McCann-Harris version allowed McDaniels to stop singing in night clubs. Brian Auger and others In 1973, Brian Auger's Oblivion Express included a recording of the song on their album Closer To It. In 1975, the band performed the song, as their closing number, at San Francisco's Winterland, when the band opened for Fleetwood Mac. Paste magazine described the performance as a "foot-stomping, full-blown funky jazz blowout" and adds: "Auger's bluesy Hammond organ licks have a timeless appeal and he and the group's offbeat humor are apparent throughout." The song was also included on the band's albums Live Oblivion (1975), Best of Brian Auger (1976), and ''Brian Auger's Oblivion Express – Live at the Baked Potato'' (2005). ==References==